TORTURE ME_ The Bandits MC(169)

I must have imagined it, but I thought she smiled while I told her about the guys coming by. She probably would have if she had been awake, but I couldn’t say if she definitely smiled or not in her current state.



I sighed, sitting at her side.



The nurse came in for her evening visit. She was a blonde with blue eyes and gentle features. She looked like a college student, probably interning with Dr. Fiso. She wore plain clinical green scrubs. I must have looked like a mess when she came in. I couldn’t remember the last time I had shaved, and I may have bathed once since returning from the lake with Julia and the guys. She gave me a sad, concerned look when she came in the room.



“Listen,” she said in her sweetest, gentlest voice, “take a few minutes to get a shower. I don’t have any other patients after Dr. Danvers, so I don’t have to rush off.”



“Thanks. You know, she smiled, I think,” I told her as I lifted my creaky joints out of the chair. “I think. I don’t know. Hell, I probably imagined.”



“She may have.” She touched my arm with a kind, gentle hand. “She may be on her way back around. Her vitals have been steadily improving, so she could wake up any minute. When that happens, she’s not going to want to see you sitting here looking tired. And trust me, I know it’s been hard emotionally, but watching after her like this has been the easy part. Wait until she starts asking for food and everything else she’s too weak to get on her own.” She winked.



“Weak, nothing! She’s been sleeping for days. She can’t use the weak card on me. I’m the one who needs a break,” I joked. “But, seriously, thank you. I’ll be out in a minute.”



“Take your time, Mr. Noll,” she said comfortingly.



I sighed again. It seemed like that was the only way I breathed lately. I laughed at myself as I grabbed a few clean clothes and headed to the bathroom to start my shower. I was getting soft. Soft wasn’t good. Nothing good ever came from being soft.



I turned on the hot water and stared at my face in the mirror while the bathroom heated up, turning away only when the mirror was too foggy to see myself in it anymore. I climbed into the shower and let the hot water rush over me.



I felt the grime that had collected on my body from sitting in the same spot for days melt away under the hot spray of water. I felt the conflict with Ivan melt away. Ivan was behind bars, and I was still alive, standing under a hot shower, bringing myself back to humanity, back to life. Dimitri was with him, and so was one of his other top men, Boris. I still had Julia, Rick, Chase, and Juarez. We may have lost Angelo, and Jorell may have disappeared, but I still came out on top, I thought.



I let the hot water run down through my hair and course down my back. I scrubbed my body, reaching into every corner, every nook and cranny with soap, hot water, and a wash cloth. I worked shampoo into my hair and let the hot water carry it away. My body was tired and sore, and it missed Julia’s touch. My skin missed her hands, her lips, her body against mine. It missed her breath. It ached for those things.



I cut off the shower and stood listening to the water drip from my body and from the faucet. Nothing existed beyond those sounds, I told myself. For a brief moment in time, all that existed was the bathroom. The whole world beyond the bathroom door was held back by just a few inches of wood and a whole lot of steam.



I wiped the fog off the mirror and grabbed my shaving cream. It was time to trim off the vegetation growing along my jaw and in front of my ears. The stubble was too much to bear, and I didn’t want to offend Julia when I kissed her for the first time after she woke up.



I stood up and looked at myself in the mirror after I finished. The man staring back at me wasn’t soft around the edges. He was hard and strong. He didn’t let anything get him down. His arms and chest were ripped and covered in tattoos that told the story of his life, of my life. That was me in the mirror. I was the strong guy, the tough guy. I was the one who shut people out and didn’t take anyone’s shit. It was time to start being that guy again, I reminded myself.



The world had beaten me down every time I let down my guard. I was the fearless president of an outlaw motorcycle club. Honestly, we were more like the gangs of the old days, and it was time I started acting like that was the kind of organization I ran. With our new position in the pecking order, the guys were going to need me to be a hard ass.



I slid on a clean pair of jeans without any boxers. Instead of a shirt, I grabbed my colors and threw them over my shoulders. I looked at myself again before turning to leave the bathroom.